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November 5, 2014

X-Men: Days of Future Past (2014)

Hugh Jackman, James McAvoy, Jennifer Lawrence, Michael Fassbender

Let me start by saying I cannot in good conscience endorse a movie in which Michael Fassbender is hotter than James McAvoy. Why the hell does Professor X have that hideous hair for his younger days? Are they trying to compensate for the fact that he spends his entire adult life bald? James McAvoy is already has that Johnny Depp dirty-hot thing going--he doesn't need scraggly hair and a 5 day stubble to push him over the edge into just dirty.

I also have an issue with prequels - I think everyone does. It's tricky to keep a movie interesting in which everyone already knows the ending. It can occasionally be successful, but for every Monsters University, there is a Oz the Great and Powerful. Or Dumb and Dumberer. But a prequel's sequel? What is this, Star Wars?

Despite these shortcomings, the movie does a number of things well. The visual effects are excellent, the premise is actually pretty interesting, and Ellen Page doesn't annoy me for once. And this is probably the first movie I've ever watched that used time travel in a way that made sense. That's no small thing, since movies love to use the time travel angle to make them seem smarter, but don't generally pass muster with anyone who's brighter than a third grader.

Where the movie loses me, however, is with its pace. I found it to be excruciatingly slow for an action movie. I hate to even say it, since it's actually a "smart" action movie and not just a movie that blows sh*t up. But I fell asleep watching this. A couple of times. And guess what? I woke up a few minutes later and nothing had happened! Again, isn't this supposed to be an action movie?

I don't know, maybe the stars weren't in alignment for me or something while watching this movie, but I really don't see what everyone was hyping here. Maybe other people are able to overlook the bizarre casting choices in which all that was required was a British accent. And good for the casting agent for looking past the fact that Peter Dinklage is an unattractive little person and making him a character in which his height plays no role, but like Jennifer Lawrence, can he not be in everything? I guess I just don't love comic books enough to watch anything and everything that features a Marvel character, which doesn't bode well for me for the coming months...